Authored by Andrew Thornebrooke via The Epoch Times,

Secretary of State Marco Rubio will not attend the G20 in protest against the hosting nation South Africa’s policies regarding land expropriation and climate.

In a post on social media platform X, Rubio accused South Africa of promoting “DEI and climate change,” which he suggested was a form of “anti-Americanism.”

“South Africa is doing very bad things,” Rubio said. “Expropriating private property. Using G20 to promote ‘solidarity, equality, and sustainability.’”

Rubio’s absence means that the United States may not be represented when leaders of the G20 meet in Johannesburg later in the year to coordinate on international economic issues.

Rubio’s comments echo similar remarks made by President Donald Trump over the weekend, in which the president accused South Africa of engaging in “a massive Human Rights violation” by allowing the government to expropriate private land for public use and vowed to cut U.S. funding to South Africa.

Those remarks targeted two South African laws: the 2024 Expropriation Act and the 2025 Expropriation Bill, which updated the circumstances under which the government could reclaim private property for public use.

The 2024 act repeals an Apartheid-era law that allowed the government to seize private land and was previously widely used against black South Africans.

The new law forbids individuals from being arbitrarily divested from their property, orders the government to pay fair market value for any property taken, and directs that expropriation be conducted equitably.

Some critics of the law, including billionaire and Trump ally Elon Musk, who emigrated from South Africa, say that the law unfairly targets white South Africans.

No race is explicitly targeted by the law, but it does require that previous land seizures based on race, such as those made during Apartheid, be taken into account when determining the appropriateness of land expropriations.

There is also the issue that more than 70 percent of private farmland in South Africa is owned by the white population, which accounts for only about 7 percent of South Africa’s overall population.

As such, the law may disproportionately impact them.

The 2025 bill, meanwhile, established that there are circumstances in which the government can seize private property without compensation.

Such circumstances include when the land has been abandoned, when the land is worth less than state investments in it, or when the property poses a direct health or safety risk.

The bill also requires that the government seek to negotiate compensation and the other terms of acquiring private property from the owner before it can resort to expropriation.